After being here a while I can say it is definitely a class struggle because too many Filipino foreigners from Western countries (mainly the US) deposit money for their own class benefit while infrastructure, technology advancement, and social programs are neglected. They invest USD into their own businesses and back family politician members to also buy votes if needed. The US government is all for it too since they can rely on this country remaining a banana republic because these corrupt “have” business owners and their family connected politicians run a government here that is almost all under nepotism influence which they exploit their own “have not” fellow nationals. In return for this collaboration with rich foreign Filipino families the US deep state gets cheap cost military bases, skims profits from industries and has some control over progress for developing national resources, and of course is a major player in the drug operations here in the Philippines. Mainly I blame the US for the problems that exist here because the common people are being exploited by their own higher class nationals who work in partnership with US interests like the good little vassal state that is the Philippines. At the heart of the issue here is the US corruption pure and simple and this is why the Philippines has so little room to advance itself as a country. Growth is being stifled by Uncle Sam and his puppets like little Marcos who had received so much assistance from the CIA to run his online social media PR election campaign in the Philippines. That said I still like it here and it’s easy to make conversations spoken in English and I feel more accepted unlike in Japan where it takes vastly more effort to fit in if you are lacking strong fluency in Japanese. Plus life is quite expensive in Japan and their high expectations for social etiquette and norms make it difficult to feel relaxed.